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Menlo-Atherton High School Administrative Vice Principal Nick Muys and Sequoia Union High School District Wellness Programs Coordinator Stephen Emmi filed a motion to dismiss a lawsuit against them for negligence and battery earlier this month. The lawsuit came after the arrest of a Menlo-Atherton student sparked backlash in May 2023.
The May 10 motion argues that the plaintiff — a 16-year-old Black M-A student who the suit refers to as K.C. — did not provide facts that support their claims. Specifically, the motion argues the plaintiff failed to support their claim that Muys acted negligently and their claims against Emmi for assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress and interfering with a person’s constitutional rights by force or threat of violence.
The motion for dismissal also contends that K.C.’s tort claim submitted to the district contradicts the lawsuit K.C. eventually filed. The claim describes the physical contact Emmi and K.C made as “Emmi physically blocked K.C. from retrieving his ‘water toy’, causing K.C. to bump into him.” But the lawsuit describes the same incident as “Emmi forcibly grabbed the toy and physically pushed into K.C.’s body.”
Muys, who is represented by Bertrand, Fox, Elliot, Osman + Wenzel, states that the lawsuit failed to identify specific conduct by him and how said conduct caused injury to K.C., both of which are required to allege negligence. The complaint claimed that Muys denied K.C.’s request to continue the conversation in private and ordered him to leave the office. The complaint alleges that those actions breached Muy’s responsibility to avoid causing unnecessary physical harm and distress and to use reasonable measures to protect students from foreseeable injury at the hands of third parties, referring to the police department, acting negligently or intentionally.
Similarly, the motion claims that the lawsuit failed to provide facts that, if true, show Emmi committed assault and battery, intentionally inflicted emotional distress, and violated K.C. ‘s constitutional rights.
The motion argues that the claim against Emmi for intentional infliction of emotional distress should be dismissed since the complaint does not adequately show unreasonable conduct by Emmi. The complaint alleges that Emmi’s conduct in “confronting, demeaning, and physically pushing into K.C., despite being aware of K.C.’s disabilities, after K.C. asked to retrieve his property, was extreme, unreasonable, and outrageous.” The motion argues that this description does not meet the standard set by Christensen v. Superior Court which defined intentional infliction of emotional distress as “Conduct to be outrageous must be so extreme as to exceed all bounds of that usually tolerated in a civilized society.”
The motion will go before a judge on June 25.
